Feature: Delivering Hope

By Jonathan Baker

Friday

May 1, 2020 at 10:56 AM

How the Panhandle COVID-19 Home Help Facebook group brought a city together during a crisis

Like cities across this country, Amarillo has struggled over the past couple of months. But within these dark times, there have been innumerable rays of bright hope. In times like these, we remember that we are a community. We remember to take care of our neighbors, to look out for those less fortunate than us. These are the times when we show up for each other.

And sometimes help comes from unexpected places. Two years ago, Lytton St. Stephen knew virtually nothing about Amarillo. Yet, the young New Mexican came here to make a new home. As the COVID-19 scourge threatened to descend on Amarillo, this new arrival decided to do whatever it took to help – marshalling a remarkably widespread and dynamic High Plains community, and beginning the work of ensuring that those most threatened by the virus – the elderly, the immunocompromised, the impoverished, the immigrants – would have what they needed to make it through. To accomplish this goal, St. Stephen and their cohorts used an oft-maligned tool: Facebook. The result was Panhandle COVID-19 Home Help, a group dedicated to “assisting those in Amarillo, Texas, and surrounding areas who are in need during the COVID-19 pandemic.”

Since the group’s inception, hundreds in Amarillo and the surrounding region have benefited from the effort. In a time of widespread dismay and economic turmoil, Amarillo came together and showed that we are still one city, one community.

Come Together, Right Now

“I think the first time [the dangers of the coronavirus] entered into my consciousness in a real way was in February,” recalls St. Stephen. “I remember, I went to a concert at Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, and I remember thinking, ‘This is a situation where I probably wouldn’t normally want to be around a lot of people, but I think I’m fine for right now.”

That concert was held on the Feb. 20, and throughout their trip to Santa Fe, St. Stephen was checking the phone, looking at articles. South Korea kept coming up in the newsfeed, “because they were doing such a great job … and then of course Italy hit. I think that’s the first time I really started thinking like, “Oh, no, this is going to be something a lot bigger than just H1N1, or any of the other SARS-related flus that we’ve heard about in the modern age.”

Like many others in Amarillo, St. Stephen was starting to get worried. “And then of course, the World Health Organization said it was a global pandemic, so [now] we had that official moniker. After that, I started watching the news very carefully.”

At that time, St. Stephen began to wonder, “What is that going to look like here? How is that going to look in the U.S.?”

St. Stephen began to worry that Amarillo as a city, was behaving in a “business-as-usual” manner. “I saw very few precautions being taken. I think maybe it was in the news, but it was just at the very outskirts of the main things happening in town. It was very much a tangential idea.”

So St. Stephen began to think of ways to solve the problem, instead of relying on traditional top-down solutions. “I’m very invested in non-hierarchical, community-based structures. So I was just trying to figure out like, “What can we do? What can I do here that maybe would help?”

What’s the Big Idea?

Then, St. Stephen did what most of us do when worry overcomes us: They took out their phone. “I initially just put a little post on my Instagram that said, ‘Hey, if you need me to run errands …’ My thought was, “If you’re an elderly person, if you’re immunocompromised, immunosuppressed, if you have a chronic illness, let me know. I’d be happy to run errands for you. I can go out and get you whatever you need, so that we can try to protect people who should be sheltering.”

After that, St. Stephen began posting more frequently. “If you need someone to talk to, because it’s hard to be alone, let me know, I can be that person.” The posts began to draw attention, to get reactions. And St. Stephen start noticing so many people in town who seemed to feel like they’d been forgotten, people who seemed to need a little extra help.

And it wasn’t just folks in need reaching out; people started volunteering to help. “I had several people reach out to me and say, ‘Hey, I see what you’re doing. If you need help also running those errands, let me know, I’d be happy to do it.’ Jenny Inzerillo being one of them, who was just like, ‘Hey, I can help you with this.’”

The gears in Lytton St. Stephen’s mind began to turn. How, St. Stephen wondered, could people be organized so that anyone needing help could receive it from a volunteer, quickly and easily? The answer was, of course, a Facebook page. “Facebook is a quick and obvious means of helping,” notes Colin Cummings, who is one of the group’s administrators. “So many people are used to using Facebook groups to get help and information. The trick has been simplifying the process so it’s organized and efficient; that’s where Lytton’s genius for teamwork came in. By focusing on the essentials – connecting those who need with those who can give – and soliciting advice and help from a core group of locals looking to contribute, Lytton has turned a simple idea into a regional resource.”

A Team Effort

Quickly, other Amarilloans began to throw in their time and energy, including Krystal Burns, Shanda O’Neill, Chriselda Reyes, Angelina Marie, and Anna Kay Reeves. The Facebook group launched on March 16, and a month later it had amassed nearly 20,000 members. “Just open posting, that’s how it started,” remembers St. Stephen. “And it quickly got very wild. At one point, I think it was the day after I started it, I ended up shutting down all comments and I had to restructure the page in a fundamental way.”

That fundamental shift entailed only allowing people to submit an “ask” or a “give.” Those in need were instructed to write “ask” at the top of their post, then say what town they were writing from. “Then they say their need,” explains St. Stephen, “and then they say if they can pay or if they can’t pay.” The process works the same for those who have extra supplies: Group members will write “give at the top, what city they’re in, and what they have to offer. And then other people can come in and comment whether they can help, or if they can give, or if they want to take. Then the exchange takes place. “And then of course, on the sides, I have these announcements under different areas, news articles and other community resources, and things like that.” And that was it. Simple, effective.

“As admins,” says Krystal Burns, co-owner of Palace Coffee and an administrator for the page, “we have a text thread that is active daily. We are constantly evaluating posts and how to get the info in front of everyone as best we can. Lytton has been so wonderful in leading this effort. I am continually impressed and inspired by their kind and passionate soul.”

To date, St. Stephen says they feel comfortable estimating that the group has helped hundreds of High Plains dwellers. St. Stephen has also personally made deliveries for the group – as have the other administrators. “I watch the page quite often,” St. Stephen says, “in the background, even when my admins are actively doing the admining. I really try to keep an eye on it, making sure that there isn’t any scamming. I generally want to believe that they’re not, but I do keep an eye on things.” When it proves difficult for someone to make a drop, St. Stephen will often jump in. “I’ll just say, ‘Hey, I can round these supplies that are being offered up, and I’ll deliver them.’”

At the end of the day, says St. Stephen, the group’s mission remains simple: to help people get by. “It’s meant to help you get what you need to get through to the next day, whatever that might be. And I’m pretty open about what that looks like as far as needs, but I’m really trying to keep it from being just a grocery delivery service. That is not the intent of the page. So I do have to tell people that, and my admins are instructed to tell folks that as well. You can’t just be here looking because you couldn’t find Frosted Mini-Wheats in the store. This is more like, do you have enough food to feed yourself and your children, do you need medicine if you’re sick.”

The Widening Horizon

In the future, St. Stephen would like to see people taking COVID-19 and similar outbreaks seriously. “That’s the main thing, be responsible about your social distancing. Americans tend to be very individualistic, and in a pandemic, you can’t be that way.”

They add: “I honestly think so much of life is about being the hysteric in the room. I feel like that’s kind of what I was doing when I started this page – I was the hysteric. And it’s proving to be very useful, being a little hysterical, shouting ‘Stay at home, stay home more than you think you have to!’ I think it’s crucial. That’s how we know, we know because this is not new. We can see it in other countries, we have seen the statistics, we know the projection of the virus. So stay home. That’s the thing I would really ask from people.”

“It’s been encouraging to see Amarillo residents pitch in to help not only other Amarilloans, but people throughout the Panhandle,” says Colin Cummings.

“I don’t think Lytton realized how quickly the COVID-19 page would grow or how impactful it would be,” says Krystal Burns. “I have been fortunate to watch Lytton lead a group of admins for the page, and it is absolutely incredible. They lead with such care and compassion. This page went from 0 to 60 VERY fast and Lytton did everything in their power to be sure every voice on the page was heard.”

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